Major Study - Internet Emits 830 Million Tonnes of CO2 Per Year!!!

Internet emits 830 million tonnes of carbon dioxide

MELBOURNE: Internet and other components of information communication and technology (ICT) industry annually produces more than 830 million
tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas, and is expected to double by 2020, a new study has found.

Researchers from the Centre for Energy-Efficient Telecommunications (CEET) and Bell Labs explain that the information communications and technology
(ICT) industry, which delivers Internet, video, voice and other cloud services, produces about 2 per cent of global CO2 emissions -- the same
proportion as the aviation industry produces.

In the report published in journal Environmental Science & Technology, researchers said their projections suggest that ICT sector's share in
greenhouse gas emission is expected to double by 2020.

Now we all know how airlines are major consumers of fuel (even though most aircraft run on diesel), but if you think about how much this is and how
technology double or triples in growth every six month - exponentially - this is going to be a major contributor to global warming and air
pollution.

I wonder if the governments know about this and hence why (in Canada as far as I know) they have introduced a carbon tax on any electrical product
(such as tvs and computers).

This is quite alarming. Not sure what to say except that I am certain the future of technology is going to create a major problem for our atmosphere
as we start to consume more energy resources to use it.

Internet Pollution – The Dirty Secret of the Information Age

On average, most data centers use approximately 6-12% of electricity to power their servers to perform routine computations. The rest of the
power is spent to keep servers idling and at the ready in case of a power surge or brown-out that could slow or crash the servers.

"Worldwide, the digital warehouses use about 30 billion watts of electricity, roughly equivalent to the output of 30 nuclear power plants. A single
data center can take more power than a medium-size town."

Most data centers run theirs servers 24/7 at maximum capacity, regardless of demand and as a result end up wasting approximately 90% of the
electricity that is pulled right of the electrical grid. To make matters worse, most rely upon banks of generators that emit copious amounts of diesel
fumes.

The inefficiency stems from the symbiotic relationship between users and the servers. Users want instantaneous access to all data, and the companies
that are at risk if they fail to meet the demand.

"It’s staggering for most people, even people in the industry, to understand the numbers, the sheer size of these systems," said Peter Gross, who
helped design hundreds of data centers. "A single data center can take more power than a medium-size town."

Google’s data centers currently consume approximately 300 million watts and Facebook’s, about 60 million watts. Many solutions are available to
help combat this out-of-control power consumption, but in an industry that cannot afford any downtime, many companies are hesitant to implement any
large scale changes.

The problem is two-fold. As users, we need to be less dependent on the data we expect to have at our finger tips at every second of every day and data
centers and the computer manufacturing industry need stricter regulations and must be made to adhere to more stringent environmental
standards.

According to their studies, what is a safe CO2 level. Their answer was:

The upper safety limit for atmospheric CO2 is 350 parts per million (ppm). Atmospheric CO2 levels have stayed higher than 350 ppm since early
1988.

As more and more consumers tap into electronics and internet, it is no wonder we are heading toward a major climate change.

For instance, they are showing trends in temperatures:

November 2012 marks the 5th warmest November since global temperature records began in 1880. The 10 warmest Novembers happened in the past 12
years. The warmest was November 2004. The coolest was November 1907.

It's legit to directly blame industries that burn fuel such as cars, trucks, and planes.. I don't like the deflected blame on things like "the
internets" because they use electricity. They don't discriminate, they will use any electricity we provide them with and if the dirty oil and gas
industries would stop holding back progress maybe the internet would be running on more clean energy sources and thus "pollute" less.

The Above Top Secret Web site is a wholly owned social content community of The Above Network, LLC.

This content community relies on user-generated content from our member contributors. The opinions of our members are not those of site ownership who maintains strict editorial agnosticism and simply provides a collaborative venue for free expression.